James Hepburn

James Hepburn

Bothwell, James Hepburn, 4th earl of, 1536?-1578, Scottish nobleman; third husband of Mary Queen of Scots. Though a Protestant, he was a strong partisan of the Catholic regent, Mary of Guise, mother of Mary Queen of Scots. In 1562, Bothwell's old enemy, James Hamilton, earl of Arran, accused Bothwell of proposing to kidnap the queen, and Bothwell was imprisoned. He escaped and started for France, but was imprisoned for a year by the English before he reached it. Mary recalled him in 1565 to help her put down the rebellion by the earl of Murray, her half brother. In 1566, Mary's secretary, David Rizzio, was murdered by conspirators, among them her second husband, Lord Darnley. Thereafter she trusted only Bothwell and was with him constantly. In Feb., 1567, Darnley was murdered. Bothwell was undoubtedly responsible, but he was acquitted in a trial that was a judicial mockery. Shortly after the trial, Bothwell abducted Mary and, having divorced his wife, married the queen. The Scottish nobles now rose against Bothwell and forced Mary to give him up (June, 1567). He fled to Denmark, where he was imprisoned and died insane.

Admiral and Casanova

As Lord High Admiral of Scotland, Bothwell sailed throughout Europe. During a visit to Copenhagen around 1559, he became enamoured of Anna Tronds, a Norwegian noblewoman whose father, Kristoffer Trondson (Rustung), a famous Norwegian admiral, was serving as Danish Royal Consul. After their engagement, Anna left with Bothwell, and in Flanders, he announced that he was out of money. He asked Anna to sell all her possessions, which she did, and she left to return to her family in Denmark to ask for more money. Anna Tronds' sister Margaret married the Earl of Atholl. Anna was unhappy and apparently given to complaining about Bothwell. Bothwell's treatment of Anna Rustung played a part in his downfall.

Queen Mary

Bothwell appears to have met Queen Mary when he visited the French Court in the autumn of 1560, after he had left Anna Rustung in Flanders. He was kindly received by the Queen and her husband, King Francis II, and, as he himself put it: "The Queen recompensed me more liberally and honourably than I had deserved" - receiving 600 Crowns and the post and salary of gentleman of the French King's Chamber. He paid a further visit to France in the spring of 1561, and by 5 July was back in Paris for the third time - this time accompanied by the Bishop of Orkney and the Earl of Eglinton. By August, the widowed Queen was on her way back to Scotland in a French galley, some of the organisation dealt with by Bothwell in his naval capacity.

Feuds

Bothwell appears to have been not much more than a troublesome noble at court following the Queen's return. His open quarrel with the Earl of Arran and the Hamiltons, who accused him of intriguing against the Crown, caused some degree of anguish to the Queen, and although Arran was eventually declared mad, Bothwell was nevertheless imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle without trial in 1562. Later that year, while the Queen was in the Highlands, he escaped.

Royal friendship

In February 1566, Bothwell married Lady Jean Gordon, the daughter of the 4th Earl of Huntly. Mary attended the wedding. But, in the summer, Lady Bothwell was seriously ill and on the brink of death. The marriage lasted just over a year.

The Queen and Bothwell were by now very close. Upon hearing that he had been seriously wounded and was likely to die, she rode all the way through the hills and forests of the Borders to be with him at Hermitage Castle only a few weeks after giving birth to her son James (later King James VI). However, historian Antonia Fraser asserts that Queen Mary was already on her way to visit Bothwell on matters of state, before she heard about his illness and that therefore this visit is not evidence they were already lovers at the time of his accident.

Darnley's murder

Bothwell was divorced by his wife on the grounds of his alledged adultery with her servant, Bessie Crawford, on 7 May1567, three months after the death of Mary's second husband, the Duke of Albany (better known as Lord Darnley). Bothwell was one of those accused of his murder. Sir William Drury reported to Sir William Cecil, Secretary of State to Queen Elizabeth I of England, that "the judgement of the people" was that Mary would marry Bothwell.

However, in the meantime Darnley's family, in the person of the Earl of Lennox, his father, were agitating for vengeance and upon his petition the Privy Council began proceedings against Bothwell on 12 April1567. Drury reported that the Queen was in continuous ill-health "for the most part either melancholy or sickly". On the appointed day Bothwell rode magnificently down the Canongate, with the Earl of Morton and Sir William Maitland of Lethington flanking him, and his Hepburns trotting behind. The trial lasted from noon till seven in the evening. Bothwell was acquitted.

The next Wednesday the Queen rode to Parliament, with Bothwell carrying the Sceptre, where the proceedings of Bothwell's trial were officially declared to be just according to the law of the land. On Saturday 19 April no less than eight Bishops, nine Earls, and seven Lords of Parliament put their signatures to what became known as the Ainslie Bond, a manifesto declaring that Mary should remarry a native-born subject, and handed it to Bothwell.

The Great Abduction

On Wednesday 24 April, while Mary was on the road from Linlithgow Palace to Edinburgh, Bothwell suddenly appeared with 800 men. He assured her that in Edinburgh danger awaited her, and told her that he proposed to take her to his castle at Dunbar, out of harm's way. She agreed to accompany him and arrived at Dunbar at midnight. Mary was taken prisoner by Bothwell. On 12 May the Queen created him Duke of Orkney, and he married Mary in the Great Hall at Holyrood on 15 May1567, (eight days after his divorce was decreed). Within three days, Sir William Drury wrote to London that although the manner of things appeared to be forcible, it was known to be otherwise.

Escape

The marriage divided the country into two camps, and on 16 June the Lords opposed to Mary and Bothwell signed a Bond denouncing them. There followed the showdown between the two opposing sides at Carberry Hill on 15 June1567, from which Bothwell fled, after one final embrace, never to be seen again by Mary. In December of the same year, Bothwell's titles and estates were forfeited by Act of Parliament for treason.

Anna's revenge

He escaped from Scotland and travelled to Scandinavia in the hope of raising an army to put Mary back on the throne. He had during that time the unfortunate experience of being caught off the coast of Norway (then ruled by Denmark) without proper papers, and was escorted to the port of Bergen. Unfortunately, this was the native home of Anna Rustung. Anna raised a complaint against Bothwell, which was enforced by her powerful family; her cousin Erik Rosenkrantz, a high-level official in Norway, remanded Bothwell to a local prison whilst Anna sued him for abandonment and return of her dowry. Reports of the court case are impressive, with Anna having been described as wearing a majestic red dress and impressive jewels. Anna must have had a weak spot in her heart for Bothwell, as he persuaded her to take custody of his ship, as a form of compensation. Bothwell would have been released, but in the meantime, the King of Denmark, Frederick, having heard that the English crown was seeking Bothwell for the alleged murder of Lord Darnley, decided to take him into custody on the mainland of Denmark.

Later life

King Frederick II of Denmark at first treated Bothwell with respect but later sent him to the notorious Dragsholm Castle, Denmark, where he was held in what was said to be appalling conditions. A pillar to which he was chained in the castle can still be seen, with a circular groove in the floor around the pillar where Bothwell purportedly remained for the last ten years of his life and where he died. His mummified body could supposedly be seen in Fårevejle, in the church near the castle, until a few decades ago. However, the identity of the body has never been conclusively proven.